In about an hour I am heading out to meet with my new personal trainer. I honestly don’t know what to expect. Here is a picture of me taken in 2003 right before I graduated from college and another taken just 2 weeks ago. I believe I was around 175 in the top picture and 222 in the bottom picture. When I saw the difference between the two pictures I knew that I needed to do something before it got out of control. (more…)
One of the most common objections to Christianity that I hear goes something like this: “You are all a bunch of hypocritical people. You are supposed to be happy and perfect.” I don’t blame them for this statement. I kind of think that as Christians we have done a horrible job of explaining that perfection and happiness isn’t the goal.
It doesn’t help that they probably don’t read the Bible. All you really need to refute this argument is a Bible. You don’t really need any particular verse. Just show them how many pages the Bible has and then ask them this, “If belief in Christ was all you needed for happiness and perfection, don’t you think this would be a shorter book?”
Honestly if it were that simple then all of the stories in the Old Testament would sound like this, “God found favor with _______ and he/she lived happily ever after.” And the New Testament stories would sound like this, “_______ trusted in Christ and lived happily ever after.” Christians know this is not the case.
David paid for his sins long after he started fully following God and Peter denied Christ three times the night that Christ was crucified (and was later crucified himself). These men were not perfect and had terrible things happen to them that certainly didn’t make them happy. Interestingly enough you cannot find a place in the Bible where it guarantees happiness or perfection. In fact the Christian life is described as difficult and hard.
We should work hard to tell others that Christianity isn’t about perfection or happiness. Christianity is about a relationship with Christ who died for our sins.
And what ever you do: DO NOT use this phrase: “Christians aren’t perfect, just forgiven.” I throw-up in my mouth a little every time I hear it. (And puppies die when you say it…just kidding…maybe.)
Lots of people are talking about Lent on Twitter and Facebook today. For those of you who don’t know what this Lent stuff is, basically it is a period of 40 days leading up to Easter Sunday that is to symbolize the 40 days that Jesus spent in the desert prior to beginning his ministry.
Jesus fasted for 40 days while in the desert. (Traditionally fasting indicates that someone went without food.) So, the biggest feature of Lent is to “give something up” for 40 days. People give up Ice Cream, Alcohol, Cigarettes, Candy, Sweet Tea, Fried Food, Caffeine, and all sorts of things.
This year I noticed that people have been saying things that sound like this, “Well, I think I will give up chocolate this year for Lent. I don’t eat chocolate all that much, so it shouldn’t be too hard to make it until Easter.” In my mind this defeats the purpose of Lent.
Lent isn’t a check-the-box exercise to get Jesus Points. Lent is a time for Christians to remove something from their lives that could distract them from focusing on the sacrifice Jesus made for us. I wonder if our insincere adherence to Lent causes people who aren’t Christians to add another reason why Christianity isn’t an option for them.
I don’t remember what my brother Clayton and I were fighting about. I was probably 10 which would have made Clayton 7. We were riding with my mom in the car on our way to get our hair cut and we started arguing. It was probably a typical argument about Clayton getting to ride in the front seat while I was forced to ride in the lowly back seat. Normally we would have a little squabble and then order would be restored. This time, however, I decided that I would escalate the situation and keep it up all the way there.
As we turned into the chipped parking lot of the fading metal building that housed the salon, my mom stopped the car just short of the parking space and began to speak in the “mom voice.” We have all had that experience before: Mom starts talking to you and her words are enunciated more clearly than ever before. She pauses briefly between each word to add emphasis as her eyes quickly dart between the two warring siblings.
I realized at that moment that I had crossed that line of acceptable complaining about a mile back as we passed the McDonald’s on Raeford Rd across the street from the Blockbuster and Food Lion. I knew that I was in big trouble and that my mom was as mad as I have ever seen her. The only saving grace in my situation was that we were about to walk into the salon and I wouldn’t get a spanking until we got home. Little did I know that I was going to make a tremendous error in the next 15 seconds. (more…)
I am going to say a pretty “un-Christian” thing: I struggle to have a regular devotional time. I know that many of you are already praying for me right now. So, let’s pause so you can finish.
One of the hallmark activities for Christians is a devotional time or “quiet-time” spent with God each day. If you have known me for any length of time at all you know that I am not a person that can just sit still and be quiet, unless I am reading or writing. The thought of me just sitting in one spot reflecting a praying for more than about 2 minutes is laughable.
I am not being glib about prayer, but I have to believe that God did not make a mistake when he created me. I don’t know of any place in the Bible where it requires that I sit in one place to pray. Prayer and reflection in the Bible happened all over the place. David sang songs in the fields and Jesus prayed in the garden.
So, I kind of have a “pray as you go” kind of arrangement and I use my writing and reading as my devotional. It works a little something like this:
So, that’s how I do devotion. Tell me, how do you do it?
I have struggled with direction for this blog almost since its inception. Originally it was called “The Deep Stuff”, because most people know me as a really fun and outgoing person and are later surprised to learn that I think very deeply and passionately about my faith and relationship with Christ. Not because I am running around like a heathen, but because I am loud and outgoing people assume that I don’t spend anytime digging deep with introspection in my own life.
I then got my own website www.austinklee.com and branched out into a lot of different areas, none of which are really fit together well and I think I have just ended up confusing my very small, but loyal, audience. The bottom line truth is that I wanted to get away from my real-life devotional and spiritual development posts. I thought that I needed to do that kind of stuff on my own in the privacy of my home office and let the blog be more of a fun place.
Then I read a post from Margaret Feinberg about how she and her husband struggled with connecting during their joint devotional time. The post talks about how they found something that works for them. It reminded me that God created all of us differently. There is no boiler plate solution for drawing close to God; alone or with your spouse. God created me to communicate and work out my salvation in front of God and everyone. (Pun most definitely intended.)
So, the blog now has direction. And I will be living in harmony with God the way he intended I should.
I would encourage those of you on Facebook to please leave your comments on the blog itself. I have installed a very user friendly commenting system and it would be fun to build a little community on my blog and see all the comments in one place.
I have mentioned before that I was able to attend this years Catalyst Conference in Atlanta because I lost my job. (Which turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to me.) I keep thinking about one of the moments of that conference that impacted all 13,000 attendees at the same time.
Jimmy was a young man from Africa. He was a Compassion International child in the early 1990′s. According to their website, “Compassion International exists as a Christian child advocacy ministry that releases children from spiritual, economic, social and physical poverty and enables them to become responsible, fulfilled Christian adults.” Sponsors give a small donation each month to their child to provide basic necessities. A sponsor is able to correspond with their child and really “watch” them grow up.
So, Jimmy was one of those kids from Africa. His sponsor was a college kid named Mark from here in the United States. Jimmy was invited to speak at Catalyst this year and as a part of his interview he read the first letter that Mark ever wrote him, way back in the early 1990′s. The letter talked about Mark’s new found faith in Christ and how he hoped that one day Jimmy would experience the same joy of salvation that Mark had received.
Jimmy told his story of the horrible conditions surrounding his childhood and how his sponsor actually provided the money that saved his life through food, clothes, and education. Then, Jimmy read his letter and was telling the crowd that he was now enrolled in seminary and wanted to graduate and go back to Africa to lead others to Christ. At that point, Ken Coleman, the interview leader asked Jimmy if he had ever had a chance to talk with his sponsor apart from the letters they wrote. Jimmy indicated that he had not had that opportunity and Ken then told Jimmy that Mark, his sponsor was at Catalyst. Jimmy turned around and there was Mark walking across the stage. (more…)
There is a scene in the movie, “Forrest Gump,” where Forrest is getting on the school bus for his first day of school. As he makes his way down the aisle all of the children prevent him from being seated because he is different. “Can’t sit here, seat’s taken,” one child says. Eventually a cute little girl named Jenny allows Forrest to sit with her and then…well just watch the movie if you don’t know what happens next.
I was working for a company as a temporary employee at one time in the tax department. Their on-boarding process was horrendous for temporary employees. I didn’t get a phone or email access with my own log-in for almost a month.
One Monday morning my cell phone rang. “Austin, this is John,” my boss said. It was odd that he would call me because he was on vacation that week. Over the next couple of minutes he explained that the cubicle I was assigned to was being reassigned to a new employee and that someone would be coming by to tell me where I was to go.
I waited two hours and no visitor arrived. Finally around 2:00pm a tall woman arrived at my cube.
Have you ever had someone talk to you like you were mentally-handicapped? Well, that is what it sounded like. She used a lilting, high pitched, sing-song voice to explain that I needed to move and that she was “so sorry” that I was being inconvenienced. I actually smiled at her because it was funny to me that her tone, body language, and short curt answers to my questions indicated that she wasn’t sorry at all. It made me feel like I was just in her way.
It took more than a week to find me a place to sit. I felt more and more like Forrest Gump each day. They would tell me where I was to sit and someone would already be in that space. “Can’t sit here, seat’s taken,” I could almost hear them saying.
The best part about the story: After all the moving around I did that week, I discovered that the cubicle that needed immediate clearing was not used the entire week.
The thing that irritated me the most about the experience was not the moving around. I was most irritated that the tall woman treated me so poorly. It is interesting to note that she worked as a recruiter for the company.
As I listened to her talk to potential clients on the phone I noticed the same tone of voice: talking to the recruits as if they were mentally-handicapped. She sounded like a corporate robot. Only saying things approved by some attorney or HR representative. She had no empathy for the people on the other end of the line. She actually seemed bothered by their presence. It was as if she was thinking, “Just shut up, answer my questions and leave me alone. You are wasting my time.”
I am often reminded that sometimes the tone of your voice means much, much more than the actual words you say. Thank you tall woman for a great reminder.
